4.29.2005

FIGHT SEASON

Reason #452 I riding the 'Sheed-Pistons bandwagon all the way to the Larry O'Bizness trophy is also reason #675 I'm loving playoff season: FIGHTING IS BACK. Ever since the Haymaker of Haymaker Hills incident, The Association's finest athletes have been all too aware, that you'd have to be as dumb as Nene Olowokandi to engage in any sort of near-fisticuffs. Even all-time NBA Techfoul leader, 'Sheed himself, has been relatively quiet this year. Gary Payton has managed not to bite Speedy Claxton's ear even once. And the heavily hyped Shaq-Kobe meet-ups were as eerily sedated as Eddie Griffin's visits to the shrink. But playoffs is where that basic testosterone-driven urge to throwdown reenters into the NBA conscience. Things get physical. Alonzo gets to be Alonzo and Dikembe gets to be Dikembe. Argentinians go wild. And Jermaine O'Neal of all people is right in the thick of the shoving. Last year Flip Saunders used the analogy of being on a too-long family vacation, and starting to get sick of the people you're stuck with. If that's the case, then let the Pacers/Celtics series go 7 games. Let Bulls/Wiz go 8. Let Danny Fortson and Andres Nocioni guard each other in the finals. And daydream about an Indy-Detroit semifinals, in which crafty ol' Stern puts the power of the almighty "ratings" dollar above all else, to let this man back into the Palace.

4 Comments:

was just talking to the 'caine on the phone about "THE SHOVE". . . o'neal has done so much to make us think about the brawl in context, it would be a shame if it now all backfired, and people saw "THE SHOVE" as evidence that he's really just an intractable thug.

but, as you say, the playoffs are their own monstrous context, one that, unfortunately, america is far more sympathetic towards than thousands of people attacking you

Did you see the hard foul that half the nuggets commited on Manu in the final seconds of the game? The ejected Carmello did not look so mello, though giving that kid his head band on his way out was sugar sweet.

FYI, hands down the best NBA blog out there guys. What happened to chaunceybillups.blogspot?